Babygirl opens with Nicole Kidman and husband Antonio Banderas having the kind of passionate, intimate sex you see in Hollywood movies. When they are done, Kidman quickly scampers off to another room to enjoy some pornography. Hollywood sex you see, often doesn't cut it in the real world. And that's really the crux of writer/director Halina Reijn's latest film, even ideal isn't good enough if you aren't being honest with yourself.
Kidman plays Romy Mathis, a tech company CEO with a charming and handsome theatre director husband (Banderas), a seemingly good relationship with her two children and at least two palatial homes. She has accomplished the "have it all" life women are told to aspire to and works hard to keep it, striving to be the best at her job, undertaking a painstaking (and painful looking) beauty routine including such delights as numbing free botox and ice baths and attempts to be the ideal loving and supportive wife. The problem is, she isn't satisfied in the bedroom, longing for something a bit more out there than her gentleman husband is comfortable with (for a creative type he is a bit of a square). Enter tall drink of water Harris Dickinson as young intern Samuel. He first catches her attention in the street when he calmly brings an out of control dog to heel and when they later meet at work it turns out he has an intuition for seeing what people need and quickly spots Romy is desperate for somebody to call the shots over her. She makes half hearted attempts to quell his directness but the pair soon end up in a master/slave style sexual relationship with the fact she is risking both career and family only fuelling Romy's desire. The central affair may have been billed as steamy, erotic thriller fodder, and at times it is, but it also has painfully awkward moments as the pair navigate their situation and find their roles. One scene involving milk will bring back nightmares to UK viewers who remember an infamous episode of Celebrity Big Brother.
The best thing about Babygirl is that it isn't a film that sets out to judge or punish its lead character for having sexual desire. There is a worrying mention early on of Romy having been raised in some sort of cult but the film settles on her desire to get freaky being part of her natural character rather than a character flaw. The moral dilemma is in her actions, not her wants. Embarking on an affair behind your partners back is one thing and the power dynamic between Kidman and Dickinson is interesting (and certainly not something that would have worked were the genders reversed). She is his superior snd supposed mentor but in many ways the power rests with him as he can, as he says, "end her with a phone call". More grey area is added by Dickinson's enigmatic portrayal of Samuel, there is no doubt he is one hundred percent complicate in the relationship, the instigator in fact, but it is mostly unclear how much his child like outbursts are part of a controlling game and how much he is just not emotionally equipped for the situation.
It feels a bit redundant to say Nicole Kidman is good but she really locks down a challenging role. For a film of this type it's low on nudity but high on emotional vulnerability and she deftly avoids the trap of making Romy a Jekyll and Hyde character with two separate personalities. There is enough fragility in her polished CEO mode that we can see she needs something more and enough steel to let us know that she put herself in her predicament willingly. Both Dickinson and Banderas are also great and there is a low key fantastic performance from Sophie Wilde as Kidman's subtly frustrated assistant, tired of not get her due and her boss's lack of action on improving things for women in the workplace.
The films weaknesses are mostly related to the story telling. It was obviously never going to be a plot heavy film; you know two people are going to meet, embark on an affair and eventually there will be some sort of reckoning. There's no problem with that but a couple of things don't quite ring true. For instance, Romy is taken aback by the way Samuel begins challenging her at work when surely slapping down cocky young men at work is part and parcel of daily working life for women in positions of power. The timeline is also a little confusing, with birthday parties, fallings out and montages it feels like a fair bit of time passes yet the decorated trees suggest the entire film takes place in the run up to Christmas.
Ultimately, your milage with Babygirl with depend on your ability to get on board with the main character's inner struggle. On the one hand, it's a film about a one percenter who takes advantage of her position of power to cheat on a loving husband rather than just tell him to get a little nasty between the sheets. On the other, its the story of a women who has done everything right but is still not whole because society has told her that being herself is in someway shameful and the damage that can do to a persons life. Or you can just pretend you are watching an after hours Hallmark movie.
7 pocket cookies out of 10.
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